Famous People with Unpromising Beginnings: People Who Defied Superiors' Opinion to Achieve Greatness

Shakespeare once wrote: ' ... some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them...’.

 

History has shown that majority of rich and famous people were not born into fame and fortune; neither was greatness thrust upon them: they achieved greatness by working at being great.

The Partitioning and Colonization of Africa: A Brief History of European Imperialism in Africa

European presence in Africa by 1875 consisted of just forts and trading posts along the coast and a few tiny colonies. That all changed after the Berlin Conference.

   

Between 1880 and 1910, Africa was divided up among the Europeans at the so-called Berlin Conference that took place in 1884. At this conference, fourteen European nations had convened to settle the political partitioning of Africa; but no African was to be invited or made privy to their decisions. Subsequently, for the next seven decades, decisions affecting Africa and its people were made not in Africa, but in London, Paris, Madrid, Lisbon and other European capitals.

Turning Back the Clock on Ageing

Aging and all the ailments that comes with it may not solely depend on physiological factor as many may have believed; it is found to be a complex function of physiology and state of mind.

According to a report published in Newsweek by Wray Herbert in April 14, 2009, Harvard psychologist, Ellen Langer did a study where she took a group of elderly men to an isolated old New England hotel, retrofitted so that every conspicuous sign was made to appear as it was two decades earlier. From their outfit to the news they watched and music they listened to, were all fixed to appear as if they were 20 years earlier.

Predicting Natural Disasters: Nature's Precursors to Unexpected Events

 Although earth scientists do not have sensors that can be used to clearly predict, in the short-term, natural disasters such as earthquake and tsunami, animals do.

Enormous amount of information abound to suggest that animals can feel an earthquake or tsunami coming a few days before these disasters actually happen. But unless more extensive research is carried out, such oddities will remain more a source of amazement than part of a systematic and precise method of forecasting natural disasters.

Earth's Place in the Galaxy Relative to Galaxies in Deep Space

There may not be a more humbling experience than looking at Earth's place in the Galaxy in relation to other heavenly bodies in Ultra Deep Field.
   
Hubble scientists attempted to accomplish something extraordinary in 1996, so they trained the Hubble telescope on a part of the sky that appeared absolutely empty. A patch no bigger than a grain of sand, held out at arm's length and devoid of any planet, stars or galaxies. The area was close to the familiar constellation, the Big Dipper.

Hubble, a space telescope launched in April 1990, has been orbiting the earth ever since. Its unparalleled advantage lies in the fact that it is stationed outside of Earth's atmosphere, thus giving it a clear view of space.

It was somewhat a risky undertaking by the astronomers, considering that observation time on this telescope is in very high demand and some questioned whether it would be wasted looking at mere darkness. Others feared that the images thus collected would be as black as the space at which it was being pointed.

The Nature of Habit: Harnessing the Power of Thought to Create the Habit One Desires

Habit is at once humanity's heaviest liability and greatest asset; it can be used to obtain whatever one dreams of, just as it can be used for self-destruction.

The Looming Water Crisis

One of the complaints you hear these days is about the high price of gasoline. But there is a more alarming crisis lurking behind the scenes: the future of our water.

Water is abundant both on and under the surface of the earth, covering about 70 percent of the planet’s surface. It also exists in the air, in the ground as soil moisture, and in aquifers. Earth’s water supply is constantly moving from one position and state to another. Without this cycle, life on earth would cease to exist.

Weaning the World from Fossil Fuels Dependence

Cars may not be the largest consumer of fuel in the world, yet it accounts for a disproportionate percentage of the world's energy consumption - enough to be a concern.

 
Automobiles came to being as a result of worldwide effort. It did not evolve from any one country or from a single person. Despite its varied evolutions, the car has not seen any drastic alterations in its primary engine structure since 1807 when Francois Isaac de Rivaz, a Swiss inventor built the first, albeit commercially unsuccessful, internal combustion engine.